Filmmaker backs Ipswich festival

AN IPSWICH filmmaker has backed the idea of an Ipswich film festival as he prepares to unveil his first feature film.

Woodend movie makers the Cunningham Clan are set release their first feature-length film, Foresight: Killer Instinct, shot in Ipswich.

The horror action flick is set in an Ipswich under siege from criminals and follows young psychic Glen Parsons, whose wife and unborn child are brutally murdered. Parsons uses his powers to hunt down villains and exact a bloody revenge.

It is director Duncan Cunningham's debut feature-length effort, four years in the making.

He is happy to see the film in the can, and is looking forward to screening it at film festivals.

The story evolved from a crime report Mr Cunningham read in the Queensland Times.

"The character goes around and gets all the wicked people. It comes from a story in the QT.

"I was reading about a crime and thought, wouldn't it be good if someone could get to the crime before he got away from it," he said.

"There is a lot more planning with feature films.

"You have to lock in locations and the cast. We had 55 people in the cast and I had to act in it myself."

An Ipswich film festival would be a fantastic addition to the region's social calendar, he said.

"There are a few emerging filmmakers in Ipswich and I think they will get behind it as well."

He said the number of significant film projects shot on location in Ipswich prove the region is ideal for filming.

"It's just got really good, iconic locations. There is pretty much everything a film needs here in Ipswich.

"The old railway workshops, churches, cemeteries and all the country out Mutdapilly way."

The Ipswich premiere of Foresight: Killer Instinct will be at the Tivoli Drive-in Theatre on October 5.